If you are using wpa_supplicant with ipw2200-firmware and it refuses to connect with the following messages in /var/log/messages:
Aug 30 13:37:02 localhost wpa_cli: interface eth1 DISCONNECTED Aug 30 13:37:02 localhost wpa_cli: interface eth1 DISCONNECTED Aug 30 13:37:14 localhost wpa_cli: interface eth1 DISCONNECTED Aug 30 13:37:14 localhost wpa_cli: interface eth1 DISCONNECTED Aug 30 13:37:26 localhost wpa_cli: interface eth1 DISCONNECTED Aug 30 13:37:27 localhost wpa_cli: interface eth1 DISCONNECTED Aug 30 13:37:38 localhost wpa_cli: interface eth1 DISCONNECTED Aug 30 13:37:39 localhost wpa_cli: interface eth1 DISCONNECTED Aug 30 13:37:51 localhost wpa_cli: interface eth1 DISCONNECTED Aug 30 13:37:51 localhost wpa_cli: interface eth1 DISCONNECTED
Check that CONFIG_KMOD=y is set in the kernel configuration. If you're using menuconfig, this is:
Loadable module support ---> [*] Automatic kernel module loading
Recompile the kernel and modules with make -j2 && make modules_install, then just to be on the safe side re-emerge wpa_supplicant and ipw2200-firmware with emerge -av wpa_supplicant ipw2200-firmware.
The odd thing about this is that the ipw2200 module seemed to load on boot, which initially lead me away from checking the kernel's module loading options.
See my post on the gentoo forums: wpa_supplicant stopped working after emerge world
